Without much prolonged talk, the burden will be a whole lot for the Army personnel to carry on despite being trained to endure bad moments and pains. Many people have been consumed because of this kind of burden of debts they carry around. I don't know whether your army elder brother will be able to survive the shame and anguish of how to pay back the $18k debt on gambling.

The questions that will be running through your army elder brother are how long would it take or how would he go about paying back the $18k debts through his monthly salary, without the army authorities knowing about it or he to do something unlawful just to pay off the $18k debt.

It will be a hard time for him, all he needs now is support and encouragement from you and his family members on how to pay back the debts so that he will commit suicide because of thoughts and shame of the accumulated debts.